Enlarging a room

[JP]

Hi,

Am buying a house, currently lived in by a family that is / has been recently refurbished etc.  I want to enlarge the lounge by knocking through into the room next door (currently the kitchen) & move the kitchen across the hall into what is now the dining room.  All this is being looked at by a local architect for me.  My question is on the wall that we are knocking through - if this is load bearing, do we have to get structural engineers involved (as I believe is required in the UK) - I know that I will get to this with the architect, was just wondering in advance.  Also, I have been quoted (not official estimate yet) 6 weeks of work to:

 - knock lounge through to existing kitchen to create big new lounge
 - remove all kitchen component, tiles etc.
 - run kitchen gas / water to existing dining room (for new kitchen)
 - take nice wooden floor from existing dining room & put in existing kitchen (big new lounger area)
 - make all walls etc. good & ready for decorating

Does this sounds reasonable in terms of time, or ahould I allow longer ?

Thanks all ... JP

 

 

[Maricopa]

[quote user="JP"]Does this sounds reasonable in terms of time, or should I allow longer ?[/quote]

Don't forget to allow 3-6 months to get 3 different quotes, and then up to another 6 months for the selected artisan to be available.[6]

[La Guerriere]

I don't thank that there is any obligation for a structural engineer. It is usually pretty obvious if it is a load-bearing wall. What will be the span of the new opening ?

Oh, and Maricopa is not joking ... everything takes forever

[JP]

Width is about 3.2m

[Anton Redman]

Not sure if this helps but the two sets of Fench Architect's drawings I have seen were annotated that the claculations for beams etc should be verifired by a structural engineer.

[mint]

As far as I know, it's the same in the UK these days.  Your architect, building surveyor work out the size of the beams but the Planning Authorities usually require that the calculations be "checked" by a structural engineer.

Any architect, building surveyor worth his or her salt would get the beam sizes right but the Council's requirements make you engage yet another bod to put the seal on it.

Don't talk to me about such inanities; drives me bonkers and there is no reason for it because the architect, building surveryor would have professional indemnity to cover their work!

[master of none]

[quote user="JP"]Width is about 3.2m[/quote]

But do the floor joists run width ways? Have a look upstairs and see which way your floorboards run, the joists should be at right angels to them. If the dividing wall is parallel to the joists it is very unlikely to be a supporting wall. I assume it is a brick/stone wall not a stud wall!

[La Guerriere]

Also how thick is the wall ?

[CeeJay]

Had a similar situation recently in renovating my son's house. We wanted to knock out the load bearing dividing wall between the kitchen and dining room to make one large area. So we invited the local (Bristol) building surveyor in to give us guidance on requirements. He suggested that if we did x, y and z, which included dimensions of wooden bearers, not even RSJ's, then he would be happy. We duly did as suggested and thereafter no problems.